Mank

Coincidentally, I had no idea this film (Mank) existed when I started writing about movies from a different age during the pandemic (different ages), that seemed to me much more daring and literary than 21st century outputs, as the idea applies to mass markets and their obsession with sequels, and not the less commercially oriented laissez-faire narrative scene.

It's difficult to situate Mank within a specific scene since it was released by Netflix (without being too obvious), whose matrices cover a wide divergent spectrum, and often impress when they aren't bewildering.

I would argue that the room for creative endeavour (and have previously) within Netflix (and other online streaming sources) is vast and modestly expanding, it's a different business model less dependent on advertising (as far as I know) and perhaps therefore retaining more vital independence (flush with cash).

I don't see many films like Mank or The Irishman or Marriage Story or Roma on Netflix (that's quite a few good ones come to think of it), but to have thought I would have seen such films on their site 10 years ago would have seemed utterly preposterous.

I shouldn't be too hard on contemporary cinema for lacking my oddball literary qualifications either, its current strengths are fantasy and adventure, not that it's impossible to blend the two (see William Gibson).

Besides I forget ye olde mutations as they apply to unexpected epochs, when suddenly there's a tangible utopian surge that hasn't been calculated through strategic planning (Aliens).

Who knows when it's bound to erupt but I think it's best not to search for it or attempt to cultivate it.

Just hopefully become viscerally aware when it happens (different styles, different tastes, relativity).

While keenly focusing on independent cinema.

Mank heads back to the '30s and '40s to recapture a waylaid aesthetic, eventually abandoned as tastes transformed and the unforeseen reimagined cinematic life.

It follows prominent screenwriter Herman J. Mankiewicz (Gary Oldman) as he writes Citizen Kane in alcoholic dismay, and reflects upon the just calamitous social confrontations that motivated bygone days.

A series of flashbacks leading to conflicts with a daring ambitious headstrong Orson Welles (Tom Burke), loves lost and uncompromised confidence spearheading bold mischievous caricatures.

Just think something up and pitch it if you have to come up with something.

In flux to subtly entertain.

People who are tired of boredom.

*Just to be clear, I find strategically planning in the arts to be somewhat dull, or to lack the excitement oft generated by spontaneous endeavours. Not that planning something isn't important, it's just that if the plan is too strict, it may miss out on many thrilling accidental opportunities. I suppose not planning something leads to mistakes, but playful mistakes are so much more fun than preplanned pretensions.

**I do think strategic planning is very important when combatting a pandemic. I'm glad I don't have to make such decisions. Hospitals are being overrun and frontline workers must be extremely stressed. I've never seen a more serious no-win situation. Eventually, a vaccine will be available. Patience and prudence.

En kongelig affære (A Royal Affair)

A gifted enlightened town doctor (Mads Mikkelsen as Johann Friedrich Struensee) fortuitously finds himself suddenly reshaping his country's (Denmark) feudal character in Nikolaj Arcel's En kongelig affære (A Royal Affair), relying heavily upon his lucid acumen to enact social democratic reforms. 

But a misguided sense of permanency and an affectionate indiscretion result in his ignominious downfall.

King Christian VII (Mikkel Følsgaard) wants little to do with ruling and prefers to revel in unconditioned debauchery.

Doctor Struensee does little to disuade his ambition and the two strike up an amiable friendship, prominently acting for the good of the people.

As opportunity strikes, freedom materializes, yet its nascent state fails to consider history's quotidien counterbalance.

As dinner is served, a competitive course of cultural compositions is collusively seared, and the foundations of a revolving polemic picturesquely present themselves.

Too picturesquely perhaps.

One of En kongelig affære's principal problems is that there aren't any proactive plebeian representatives. A film boldly illustrating a crucial moment in Danish social democratic development should have likely included characters to whom said developments directly apply.

Instead they're stereotypically depicted as a mob.

It may have been too maudlin to include proactive plebeian reps but it also lacks a healthy contingent of subtle continuous economically disadvantaged background personnages which could have diversified its filmscape.

Obviously doing this continuously throughout a film is expensive and time consuming, and since En kongelig affære highlights the dangers of proceeding too quickly with social democratic reforms, perhaps this is an example of form working hand-in-hand with content.

The economic dangers are obviously real but so are the dangers of a right wing government that constantly pleads poverty (or creates an inexhaustible debt) when there is in fact of abundance of wealth, and the film examines a period which inaugurated social democratic reforms, not one where they already hold partial institutional prominence in some countries.

The King is at least cognizant of his faults and logically prefers friendship to fidelity considering his own predilections.

The film also concerns a love affair.

Don't know if I've ever seen a better example of the ridiculousness of the absolute application of ideology than when the Queen (Alicia Vikander [Denmark's Keira Knightley or Natalie Portman?]) is told to be more ladylike while giving birth.

Outstanding.